Who owns your email?
Tags :Rant
The New York Times ran an editorial and it
was picked up by numerous papers around the world even (here is eTaiwanNews).
It brings up a great point. While there are laws on wiretapping
communications, there are also laws for ownership of data at the provider
level and corporate level.
- Provider Level - If your ISP spools mail
on their servers, according on how the law was interpreted, they could
maintain copies of your mail without any legal ramification if your current
agreement does not state otherwise.
The decision, on a 2-1 vote by a panel of the U.S.Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit in Massachusetts, sets up a frightening precedent
So this deals with the mail in storage, not transit. While they cannot grab mail as it runs across their system legally, they can maintain copies (this would be backups and other images) of the mail that resides on the server for any amount of time. Sure you say, we are covered, but do you really understand your agreement with your provider? - Corporate Level - Most companies I deal with in current times have some sort of Internet Usage Policy, or at least a best use program on the corporate email system. This includes content requirements and personal use standards. The company reserves the right to store, filter and basically look for content violations. We all know they back it up and store it somewhere. Those of you under new requirements may have backups around for years now.
You acknowledge, consent and agree that Yahoo! may access, preserve, and disclose your account information and Content if required to do so by law or in a good faith belief
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On Monday, July 5th, 2004 by Chris Miller
